I’ve just listened to a program on Maine Public Radio on the virtues of leisure. The discussion touched on how many people are retiring early these days, in their early 50s, as compared to our parents who had to work until at least 65, but the focus was on what to do with all this idle time.
My question exactly. As I listened to the proponents of leisure describing how they plan to live out their retirement, I realized that I will probably never be able to really retire. The idea of leisure makes me break out in hives. It conjures up images of boredom and uselessness. Some on the program agreed and had taken other jobs to fill up their idle time.
That led me to the question, “Will a multi-tasker ever be able to enjoy leisure?”
“Multi-tasking” is a relatively new word that seems to characterize an attitude prevalent among women in general and me in particular. Leisure is a dirty word.
If I have to talk on the phone, I bring the phone to my computer so I can scan the Internet while talking on the phone. When I eat, I can’t just eat; I need to be reading something, paying bills, etc. The idea of lying in the tub for even five minutes makes me begin to fidget. I cannot stand to just watch TV. I have to have a project going, and the territory around my chair testifies to that need. I usually listen to TV and look at whatever I’m doing at the time. Even if I’m reading, my foot is swinging, my fingers tapping or I’m actually cooking a meal and reading in between adding ingredients to the soup.
No quiet idleness
Whenever we go camping, I bring knitting and sewing projects, journals to write in, books to read, anything that will get me through the idleness of sitting beside the fire.
I never really noticed my problem until my auntie said to me one day, “You just can’t sit still, can you?” She was right. I even hate to go to bed at night because it seems like such a waste of time. Without question, I am a multi-tasker.
Given my disposition, then, the thought of endless hours of leisure, put me into a state of fear and trembling when I recently retired from my teaching job at SAD 44. Images of my grandparents rocking away on their porch day in and day out filled me with dread.
But there was a bright side. In my imagination I now had time to do everything I had not been able to do when I was working, so I signed up for it all. And for a while, I was blissfully happy. Then reality set in. It was Donnie, the solid ground of my life since I was 17, who pointed out to me that I was absolutely crazy.
Still fighting deadlines
One beautiful summer evening when he wanted me to sit with him on the porch and watch the sky change from light to dark, I didn’t have time. I had this to do and that to do – deadlines, deadlines, deadlines. “I am wondering,” he said, “when you are going to be able to fit me into your busy schedule.”
Oops. “You have time,” he continued, “to do all this stuff, but there’s not much of you left over for us.” Double oops.
He was right, of course, and I have to admit, I had begun to notice that I also didn’t have time to do my projects any more. When my sister visited a year ago, I got her started on quilt making, and every time I talk with her on the phone, she has made two or three new quilts. A quilt I’ve been trying to make for my grandson (I bought the fabric when she was here), which I thought I would be able to finish by his birthday, is still sitting beside the sewing machine.
“How do you have time to do all this?” I asked her.
“I don’t feel the need to save the world,” she answered.
The truth finally sank in. My post-retirement schedule was more demanding that my work schedule. I was gone every day to some meeting or another and literally had no time to do anything. Retiring had originally been very attractive because I would have more time, but then the idea of “more time” collided with my fear of being idle and turned into spaces I needed to fill up.
I finally stopped trying to do it all, but am I cured? Heavens no! Here it is Sunday, and as I am writing this, I have a cup of soup balanced on my knee. Old habits die hard. But maybe I won’t feel so guilty when I just sit this afternoon, soaking up heat from the wood stove, doing nothing else but reading.
Jeanette Baldridge is a writer and teacher who lives in West Paris, who is a regular contributor to this column. She can be reached by e-mail at [email protected].
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